


at the end of the world

by SemperAeternumQue



Series: Never Coming Home [5]
Category: Danger Days: The True Lives of the Fabulous Killjoys - My Chemical Romance (Album), The True Lives of the Fabulous Killjoys (Comic)
Genre: AO3 let me tag platonic cherri & newsie content challenge 2k20, Angst, Cherri Cola Has Issues, Families of Choice, Fluff and Angst, Gen, Implied/Referenced Self-Harm, Implied/Referenced Suicide, Swearing, also cherri is trans that isnt relevant to the story but i just think you guys should know, follow-up to my other fic, fuck you they're siblings, im slowly pulling together a timeline woo, my oc makes a brief appearance, no beta we die like the fab four, none of them are cis, probably go read that one first, rated t for language and some discussion of dark topics, some of the fab four are there briefly, they're all a family fuck you, yes there's christmas in this yes it's august mind your business
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-08-08
Updated: 2020-08-08
Packaged: 2021-03-06 03:01:42
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,861
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25776316
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/SemperAeternumQue/pseuds/SemperAeternumQue
Summary: Cherri Cola is back from the dead, but that doesn't mean everything is solved right away. Not to mention that, unsurprisingly, there are some important conversations you need to have after you went to rescue your brother from the dead.(Direct follow-up to if i died we'd be together.)
Relationships: Agent Cherri Cola & NewsAGoGo, Agent Cherri Cola & Show Pony (Danger Days), NewsAGoGo & original character
Series: Never Coming Home [5]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1865842
Comments: 16
Kudos: 12





	at the end of the world

**Author's Note:**

> Hello fuckers! Since I can't let this universe rest, apparently, I decided to write more about what happens in the aftermath of if i died we'd be together, which you can find  [here] . This is a lot fluffier than the rest of the fics in this series, mostly found family with a tiny bit of angst because Cherri is not okay (he promises). 
> 
> Warnings: Some pretty frank discussions of suicide and some implied past self harm.
> 
> Pronouns:  
> Cherri Cola - he/him  
> Dr. Death Defying - he/him  
> NewsAGoGo - she/they  
> Show Pony - ey/em  
> Jet Star - they/them and he/him  
> Party Poison - they/them  
> Kobra Kid - he/him  
> Penny Pincher (my oc who makes a brief appearance) - ae/aer and xe/xem/xyr

There was no time for the serious conversations that one needed to have when one had quested into the realm of the dead for their brother the next day, or the one after. Newsie didn’t sleep for a week like they’d threatened too, but they did sleep in until about noon the following day, leaving the afternoon for more catching up and a little bit more ‘you scared the hell out of us never do that again’ to which Cherri dryly said that he would attempt not to die, but death was an inevitability for anyone who wasn’t some sort of storybook immortal. (That earned him a lot of shit for being so depressing.) 

And the day after that, there wasn’t time for important conversations either, since that morning they woke up to three teenagers bursting through the door with a collective “Hi, Doctor D!” and a lot of drama between the three of them. Well, mostly the first one. D explained that these three were the Terrific Trio, a group of young killjoys who Pony had run into and helped out while Cherri and Newsie were off in the Phoenix Witch’s domain. They had already made themselves a fixture of the radio station, dropping by every so often to annoy the radio crew, and they were scouting for a permanent home in the area. Newsie thought they seemed rather chaotic. 

After that, there were announcements to make on the radio (“Turns out our favorite radio poet didn’t get himself ghosted after all and NewsAGoGo is to thank for that, not to mention that they’re back with a vengeance.”) a poetry corner to get up and running again, and more people to tell (“So, sorry I vanished for a month, Hot Chimp.”)

And finally, almost a full week after Cherri and Newsie’s return, there was time to sit down and talk about what had happened in the unreality and before then.

“Why do you think there was an oak tree in Death Valley?” That was how Newsie started the conversation, flopping down next to Cherri on the old and rather saggy sofa of the radio shack.

Cherri shrugged. “Witch magic? Everything there seemed just not quite right, even to me as a spirit.”

“Well why would the Witch do that?” Newsie didn’t wait for his answer before asking more questions. “What was it like as a spirit, by the way?”

He frowned, tilting his head thoughtfully. “It was odd. Very odd. The Witch kept me next to her for a while- I don’t think I could fully move on because she didn’t have my mask. So I ended up in that weird borderland for a while, too, floating around. The further I got towards reality-reality, the less I could do to influence the world. And the further I got towards the spirit-whatever, the more I could do.”

“So were you like, following me the whole time?”

“Oh- yeah. I was.”

“Creep,” Newsie laughed, giving him a playful shove.

“I wanted to help!”

“Well you weren’t much help with the walking!” They gave him a grin to show they didn’t mean their harsh words.

“I couldn’t do much,” Cherri defended, smiling back at her. “You were still too close to actual reality, so all I could really do was brush against you and make sure you didn’t get lonely.”

“You’re _such_ an older brother. I’m assuming it was you steadying my hands on the ray gun, too?”

He nodded. “By that point, I could speak and you would hear me as a low whisper, but I was still most capable of physical touch.”

She nodded too. “Makes sense. So by the end…”

“You were starting to be faded because you didn’t belong in the spirit world. So I couldn’t see you as well, but I could still see and hear you, and you could see and hear me, I think.”

“Yeah.” Newsie messed with the edge of her shirt. “Thanks for that, by the way. Don’t know what I would have done if you hadn’t shown up.”

“I think I should be thanking you, given all the effort you went to just to get me back from the dead.”

“Just,” Newsie snorted. “ _Just_. As if your life wasn’t worth every second of that fucking walk.”

He looked incredibly touched. “Oh. Well thanks any-“

“No, seriously. I bitch about it a lot, but you know I’d do that a hundred times if I had to, right?”

Cherri’s eyes were glittering with tears, and Newsie glared at him. “Don’t you dare start crying, asshole, I’m trying to get it through your thick head that people care about you.”

He laughed softly, wiping his eyes. “I love you, Newsie.”

“Love you too, fucker.”

* * *

“What was it like to die?” That was Show Pony, his time, and Newise glared at em across the room as Cherri flinched. 

“Well, it was painful, as you might expect. And…scary. Dying was terrifying.”

“Why?” 

“God, Pony, shut up,” Newsie muttered to herself. 

Cherri didn’t seem to mind the questioning. “It was scary because I knew I was leaving you guys.”

“Aw, Cher!”

“I didn’t want to die alone,” he went on. “I never wanted to die alone.”

“Why’d you leave?”

“Because I wanted to not be hurting anymore,” Cherri said simply. “I didn’t want to die, not really. It just seemed like the easiest way out. I realized I didn’t really want to leave you all maybe three days in, but by that time, I was already dying. And I was helpless to do anything.”

“Oh.”

“So there’s your answer. Dying is terrifying, and lonely, and painful. But peaceful, too, when you finally close your eyes. There’s no pain when you’re already dead, but…it was still a mistake. I still never should have left.”

“Don’t think Pone was ready for that much honesty, Cherri,” Newsie put in.

“In my defense, ey asked.”

Pony had been briefly shocked into silence, but ey returned to asking questions almost immediately. “So, then did the Phoenix Witch take your soul?”

Cherri nodded, running a hand up and down his arm. “She took the bracelet that Newsie gave me, said it was the closest thing to a mask in terms of soul that she would be able to get. It wasn’t enough for me to fully move past, but it let me into the borderlands between this world and the next. That was where the Witch let me stay until Newsie came for me, and she let me walk next to Newsie on their quest.”

“And you were _such_ an older brother,” Newsie complained.

“That’s kinda my job, isn’t it?”

“It doesn’t _have_ to be, you chose to adopt me as your sibling.”

“Oh, well would you like me to redact that?” He was smiling, a little bit playful and a little bit wry.

“Nope! You’re stuck with me now, no taking it back.” 

“And I wouldn’t want to.”

“Awwwww, do I get to be your sibling too, Cola?” Pony was grinning.

“You get to be my nibling,” Cherri deadpanned.

Pony threw back eir head and laughed. “You’re not old enough to be my uncle, but I’ll take it.”

“Bold words from the person who’s always calling me old.” 

This time, Newsie joined in Pony’s laughter. “You _are_ old!”

“Well if you’re my sister, and I’m old, what does that make you?”

“Young and fun because I’m the younger sibling,” Newsie declared with as much seriousness as she could manage.

Pony was laughing so hard ey fell off eir chair, and that was how D found the lot of them five minutes later, collectively laughing and cracking jokes about age as Pony laid on the floor giggling.

“This is why I can’t leave to do my broadcasts,” he muttered, shaking his head.

“I promise I tried to keep everyone sane,” Cherri said, but he was laughing too hard for that to be really believable.

“Uh-huh, and my name is Dr. Life-loving.”

Newsie almost fell off her own chair laughing, sliding down to join Pony on the floor as Cherri giggled. “Okay, that was a little funny.”

“Anyways, I was coming to tell you that I checked the date, and you ought to be very excited.”

Newsie and Pony both sat up straight at that, ceasing their hysterical laughter.

“Oh?” Cherri was still grinning, but not giggling anymore.

“Christmas is just around the corner, which means-“

“GLITTER!” Show Pony shouted at the top of eir lungs.

“A massive tumbleweed that will fill half our living room and be covered in glitter!” Newsie contributed.

“Decoration!” Cherri looked like a child on Christmas Eve, which wasn’t too far off. “Right, who wants to help me get the stuff out of the attic?”

“Not it, there are spiders up there!” Pony shivered dramatically. “Big spiders!”

Newsie flipped em off with a groan as she climbed to her feet, following Cherri up the ladder into the cramped little ‘attic’- more of a crawlspace, really, but it was where they stashed all their random things, including but not limited to spare power pup, Christmas decorations, old poetry, a bottle of bright pink spray paint, and two Helium Wars era shotguns. Which meant, of course, that it was perpetually a mess, and quite dusty. There were also quite a few spiders, Pony wasn’t mistaken about that.

Newsie squashed one that tried to crawl over her hand. “Alright, fucker, where did you stash the fucking decorations this time?”

“Back here, I- achoo! I think.”

“Great, pass them over to me so we can get down, huh?”

“Hang on, I’m still looking.” 

She waited in silence for a few more moments as Cherri banged around, occasionally swearing when he hit his head on the ceiling. “Hey, uh, Cherri?”

“Yeah? You okay out- fuck! Fucking beams- There?”

“Yeah, I’m fine. Just wanted to say…you know what you were talking about earlier? When Pone was asking all those questions?”

They couldn’t see him very well, only a bit of his legs, but they knew he had gone still by the lack of crashing and banging. “Yeah?”

“I figured I’d say that you can- and should- talk to us, fuckface. You don’t have to fight all your battles alone, you know.”

“Oh.” 

“We want to help. And we don’t want to trek five hundred fucking miles to get you back from the Phoenix Witch again.” 

“Oh. Thank you.”

“Anytime, fucker.”

Cherri emerged a second later with the big box of decorations, passing it over to Newsie with a tiny sniff. “Fucking dusty back there.”

They smelled bs, but they decided he could keep his pride for now. “Why do you think I made you do that part of it?” She climbed a few steps down the ladder, setting the box on the ground before hopping off fully. Cherri followed them down, still sniffling a little as he gave one final sneeze. 

“We should clean up there,” D muttered.

“Yeah, and how are we supposed to keep dust out of the _desert_ , genius?”

D gave her a glare. “That’s the point of this building.”

“Yeah, well dust gets everywhere.” She pulled open the box as Cherri peered inside. 

“Hey, we kept that wreath I found last year! Great!”

“Of course we did, do we ever throw anything away?” D was smiling, despite his seemingly irritated words.

“Nope!” Pony went skating by, grinning. “Sparkle time! I’m off to the glitter stash.”

“Yeah, you do that,” D sighed.

“I’ll detangle these, see if I can get some working,” Newsie decided, pulling out a strand of lights.

“And I’m going to go get a tumbleweed,” Cherri said with a grin.

“Don’t you dare go alone, you’ll get run over by a tumbleweed! I’m going to radio that Terrific Trio and see if one of them will help,” D said firmly. 

The floor wasn’t exactly comfy, but it was a good enough place to sit as Newsie detangled and fiddled with the lights. Honestly, they would think there was a better way to do it than throw it all in a box every year and have to re-detangle it the next.

After about twenty minutes, a tall killjoy she vaguely recognized as a member of the Terrific Trio came to join her. “Hey, uh, Dr. Death Defying said that I should help with detangling these and sorting the ornaments? Poison and Kobra are going with Cherri Cola to go get a tumbleweed.”

“Oh, my dumbass brother.” They nodded. “Sit on down, sort some ornaments. I’m sure Cherri will look after your friends.”

“He’s your brother?” They could practically see the wheels turning in Jet Star’s head.

“Yeah. We don’t look much alike, I know. It’s not ‘legal’, or whatever.”

“Oh.”

“Yeah, we’ve been friends for years and we just decided we were siblings somewhere along the way.” She swore as one of the lights flickered out.

“Oh no!” Jet was sorting the ornaments very precisely. “That’s sweet though, you just adopted him as your brother?”

“Uh-huh. He’s the older one because he’s such a protective dork. Fucking idiot.”

“Ah. I don’t have any siblings, but Poison is so protective of Kobra. Is Cherri like that?”

“Oh Witch, yeah. Just because I’m ‘reckless’ and ‘get myself into trouble’ well who fucking died? Not me.”

Jet was giving her a very concerned look, and she sighed. “Sorry. I’m salty at my brother. Fucking idiot, I had to walk so far to get him back that one time.”

“Oh.”

They didn’t get a chance to say anything else because at that moment, Cherri came through the door, dragging a truly massive tumbleweed. He was followed by Kobra Kid, looking extraordinarily disgruntled and covered in bits of tumbleweed, and Party Poison, who was laughing their ass off.

“Kobra- Kobra he got stuck in the tumbleweed! He got fucking stuck!” 

“I almost died, asshole!”

“No, you just got stuck in a fucking tumbleweed!”

Cherri looked somewhere between exasperated and amused. “He did, but he’s out now, so please stop laughing, Poison.”

That mostly shut them up, since they shot a glare at Cherri instead, but they were still smirking as Kobra flipped them off. Newsie thought the whole thing was pretty funny, to be honest. 

“So! Fucker! You got a massive fucking tumbleweed?”

“Yep.”

“And where are we going to put that?” D’s voice was exasperated (as was common) as he stuck his head into the room.

“The living room,” Cherri said with a straight face (or, well, the straightest face a gay poet could possibly manage). 

“Not what I meant.”

“I know.”

“You, my dear Cherri, are a bit of a bastard sometimes.”

“Only I get to call him that,” Newsie protested. “He’s _my_ brother, only _I_ get to call him a bastard.”

D sighed. “Fine. Anyways, Cherri, where are we putting this?”

“I figured over here?” Cherri was putting the tumbleweed in place in a corner, and D nodded with another sigh. 

“That works.”

“Great! Decorating time!”

“And that’s our cue, since my brother is going to stab me,” Party Poison announced. Newsie waved goodbye to them as the Terrific Trio made their way out, laughing and swearing at each other in equal measure. Which left the radio crew to put lights and ornaments and ridiculous amounts of glitter on a tumbleweed, followed by a strand of bad luck beads each. 

* * *

Seeing the beads hanging there had given Newsie an idea, and the next day, she hopped on her motorcycle. “I’m heading to the Zone Four market, fuckers!”

“Have fun, Newsie!” Cherri shouted back.

“See ya!” Pony chimed in.

Newsie waved as they revved the engine and sped off.

The market was as bustling as ever, and Newsie had to shoulder her way through the crowd in order to get to the one ‘joy who they knew sold semi-decent beads. “Oof. Damnit. Fuck!” They applied a well-placed elbow to get past the large group of killjoys blocking their way and tromped up to the little stall. “Hey.”

“Oh, hi…NewsAGoGo, was it?” The ‘joy shot her a charming smile. Xe was probably a bit older than her, maybe around Cherri’s age, and Newsie knew ae always had the best beads.

“That’s me and you well know it, Penny Pincher.”

“Oh good, always want to remember my best customer’s names. What can I do for you this time?”

“I could use some beads, wood if you have them.”

“We’re out of stock today, will plastic do?”

Newsie sighed. Plastic would be cheaper anyways, she supposed. “Plastic is fine. I need enough for a bracelet, about as many as I got last time.”

“That will be twenty carbons.”

“Swindler. I’d pay five.”

Penny Pincher laughed and pushed xyr coppery hair out of xyr face. “Ten.”

“Seven.”

“Make it eight and you’ve got a deal.” Ae dropped a couple of extra beads into the little bag, tilting aer head at Newsie questioningly.

“The extras seal the deal,” Newsie laughed. They passed over eight carbons, giving Penny Pincher a smile. “Thanks, Penny!”

Penny grinned back. “Anything for my favorite NewsAGoGo!” Xe waved her off with another bright grin, shining like pennies in the sunlight.

Newsie’s next stop was a ‘joy called American Idiot who sold paints and other art supplies relatively cheap, and then it was back home to the radio station. Cherri seemed to have gone out when she returned, thankfully, seeing as his truck was gone. 

“Where’d Cola go?” Newsie asked, wandering into the living room. 

“Think he’s off to get some water for some crew that got themselves in a pickle,” Pony told them. Ey was lounging on the sofa. “They’re all hurt and don’t have carbons to spare, so you know our Cola just had to go help them.”

“Of course he did.” They plunked down on a chair, setting down the paint and beads. “Warn me if you hear the truck coming, will you?”

“Will do. Whatcha making?”

“A bracelet for Cherri.” She picked out her first color, a pretty sky blue, and started to paint careful designs onto a few beads.

“Shiny! I bet he’ll love it.”

“He better, American Idiot practically swindled me out of all my carbons,” Newsie muttered. That wasn’t exactly true, she had bought some of the nicest paints the other ‘joy was selling, and a lot of them too, but they were still overpriced. Better than going to Tommy Chow Mein’s, though, so they still thought it was a good choice.

She had most of the beads painted by the time Cherri came back, yawning and rubbing his forehead. “Well, that was a day.”

“What happened?”

“Just some idiots being stubborn.” He peered curiously at the bead she was painting a little tree onto. “What are you doing?” 

“None of your business, nosy brother,” Newsie replied. 

“I was just curious,” Cherri said mildly. He pushed Pony’s feet off the end of the sofa to make a place for him to flop down. “Pone, your feet are gross. Stop putting them on the couch.”

“As if your feet are any less gross!”

“Well _I_ don’t put my feet on the sofa when other people are trying to sit there, at least.”

Pony pouted. “Fine, you win.” Ey flipped around so eir feet were dangling off the other end of the couch and eir head was in Cherri’s lap. “I’m not moving, though.”

Cherri chuckled and brushed his fingers through eir (currently rather sparkly) hair. “That’s alright, I won’t kick you out of your spot.” 

“This is why I like you better than Newsie.”

“You only like him because he’s a pushover!” Newsie hollered across the room. 

“Hey!” Cherri was grinning tiredly despite his protests. “Maybe I’m just nice.”

“Uh-huh, sure. No, you just never stick up for yourself! Pone isn’t going to die if you don’t let em sprawl on the couch, you know.”

Pony put a hand on eir forehead like a fainting woman in an old-timey painting, sitting up off Cherri’s lap just so ey could ‘faint’ back into it. “You don’t know that, maybe I _will_ die! I am gay, after all.”

“The gayest Pony in the desert,” Cherri laughed fondly.

“And don’t you forget it!”

* * *

A few weeks later, it was Christmas day. Usually, being in the desert was about survival. But being a killjoy was about living. Everyone would die in the end, killjoys sooner than most, so they had to take advantage of the time they had. So just for that one day, they ate their nicer food, and danced around to shitty Christmas music which Show Pony sang along to at the top of eir lungs, and eir singing might not have been on-key, but it was filled with joy and feeling. 

Gifts were usually small in the desert, but they all happily exchanged them that evening anyways. Pony had painted ‘world’s best dad’ on a mug for Dr. Death Defying (and covered it with glitter), and for Newsie and Cherri there were pins. Cherri’s said “I lived, bitch” and Newsie’s said “I met the Phoenix Witch and told her to fuck off”. 

“This is the best thing I’ve ever owned,” she told Pony (after she had finished laughing, that is).

Ey bowed dramatically. “Pleased to be of service.”

Meanwhile, the glitter trio (as Pony had declared them) had all pooled their collective carbons, braincells, and scavenging skills to find a set of rare vinyls for D, who spent the next ten minutes exclaiming over and examining them. “These are incredible, you three!”

Cherri, Pony, and Newsie exchanged satisfied grins. 

“Glad you like it,” Cherri told him, still grinning.

Pony nodded. “Uh-huh! Those took some trickery to acquire!”

“I _love_ them, thank you.”

Cherri turned out to have written a poem for each of them, producing three relatively nice sheets of paper covered in his messy but lovely handwriting. Newsie’s was about life, death, siblings, and the word ‘fucker’, a silent promise hidden in every line that said ‘I won’t leave you again’. She didn’t know what the other two’s were about, but she did know that D gave Cherri his sad smile and Pony threw eir arms around Cherri with a “Love ya, Cola.”

And Cherri smiled and said “I love you too.”

Finally, Newsie got to give Pony a new bottle of glitter to add to eir collection (which had cost a pretty penny, they might add), and D a patch for his jacket that they and Cherri had worked on with Pony as well as the records. And finally, finally, she got to give Cherri the new bracelet.

Cherri didn’t look up from the bracelet for several moments after they placed it in his hands, turning it over and over and examining the patterns.

Eventually, Newsie got nervous enough to speak. “I figured I’d make one. Since, you know. Since the Witch took your old one.”

Cherri was smiling broadly as he did look up, still holding the strand of bad luck beads carefully. “I _love_ it, Newsie.” He slid the bracelet onto his wrist, still grinning. “Thank you so much.”

“You’re welcome,” she shrugged. “Fucker.”

“I love _you_ , Newsie,” he added.

“Love you too, fucker.”

**Author's Note:**

> I hope you enjoyed this (and bonus points if you spotted the references to my Christmas fic, There Are So Many Special Things About You). 
> 
> Come yell at me here on or tumblr @always-and-forever-a-killjoy, I thrive on feedback!


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